Bill may help settle 84 legacy lawsuits against oil companies in Acadiana

A bill expected to be filed Monday may affect the future of 84 Acadiana legacy lawsuits currently being waged by landowners against gas and oil companies.

There are more than 360 legacy lawsuits in Louisiana courts, according to the Department of Natural Resources. Sen. Robert Adley, R-Benton, will file the bill, which specifies what damage and contamination a gas or oil company can be held responsible for repairing and cleaning up. DNR would devise a plan for restoring and cleaning the land that the oil or gas company would have to follow.

Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association President Chris John said he believes this bill would retroactively aid in settling those suits.

The association defines a legacy lawsuit as one in which “a landowner claiming that oil and gas operations, often many years ago, caused his property to become polluted and contaminated. These suits typically name every operator who ever worked at the site as defendants, often going back decades.”

“We — the landowners and the gas and oil companies — have all been stuck in neutral because it takes years for these legacy lawsuits to work their way through court,” John said. “The oil companies feel they’ve been extorted when judgments well over the value of the property or the cost to clean it up are handed down.

“With this bill, a landowner gets his site cleaned up to regulatory standards. If the landowner is a rice or sugar farmer, for example, and the oil company needs to make specific restorations so the land can be farmed, the bill covers that, too.”

John said his views are based on a preliminary version of the bill that had been written by Thursday but not filed. When Gov. Bobby Jindal endorsed the bill last week, he was flanked on stage by landowners and oil executives.

John said the relationship between landowners and Big Oil has sometimes been adversarial. The president of the Louisiana Landowners Association joined oil executives in supporting the legacy lawsuit bill.

Attorney Warren Perrin said he is skeptical about the crucial role Adley gives DNR in creating a cleanup and restoration plan and enforcing it.

“If the bill transfers authority from the courts to DNR, well, DNR is so close to the oil companies the bill is a bit like having the fox guard the hen house,” Perrin said. “DNR doesn’t have adequate staffing to take over these contaminated and damaged sites.”

Louisiana Oil and Gas Association President Don Briggs often blames legacy lawsuits for driving oil companies out of Louisiana, citing a 2012 study by Louisiana State University professor David Dismukes claiming legacy lawsuits cost Louisiana 30,000 jobs. But Dismukes’ study methodology and math have been criticized as flawed by other academics.